‘He never bothered us. No one bothered us until those Toronto sharks of yours bullied him into selling.’

‘How inconvenient for you.’

‘On the contrary, it was wonderful. It was a miserable little cabin before they paid us to put in electricity and water.’

‘You fleeced them, I suppose.’

‘Of course, but don’t think they didn’t deserve it. They didn’t have the first idea what they were doing.’

Like me, I think. I spoon the pork onto plates. The meat is soft and falls apart to the touch. ‘So you squatted in a town that didn’t belong to you, you used other people’s money to make yourself more comfortable, then, as thanks, you bankrupted them.’

‘Oh, I can’t claim all the credit myself,’ Duval replies cheerfully. ‘There were other like-minded people fleecing them all over the States. They owned dozens of towns like Temerosa. Bought them up with the idea of renovating them and selling them to – and I quote – “The New Pioneers of the West”, for which read a bunch of white bigots living in exclusionary gated communities.’

‘And then we came along.’

‘Yes.’ He pauses. ‘Then you came along.’

I look down at my plate, feeling awkward, a little angry. No wonder Duval had always seemed so scornful of the plans for the town.

‘I used to think about you, you know,’ Duval says quietly. ‘I’d lie upstairs, stare at the moon through that rotten little square of a window and wonder what you were doing on the other side of it.’

I look up to see him smiling and remember his resistance to widening the window.

‘And what was I doing?’

‘Well, to be sure, I fell asleep before I got that far.’

I laugh.

‘I had it all worked out you know – you, your husband, your London life.’

‘My London life,’ I repeat and the words sound far away and unfamiliar coming out of my mouth.

‘I imagined you ruthlessly efficient by day, juggling children, housekeepers, shopping, lunches . . .’

‘Ah . . . that sort of woman.’

‘Don’t interrupt.’

‘Sorry.’

‘At night you would get ready to go out in front of a long mirror, frowning at invisible worry lines. Then you would stop in to kiss the children good night before stepping out to meet your friends to discuss over expensive bottles of wine which part of the world you would next choose to turn into your playground.’

‘So a spoilt, shallow socialite then,’ I say lightly. ‘What a contrast to your Zorro; Duval, the quixotic smuggler of men, selflessly sacrificing your creature comforts for a life helping the poor and the desperate.’

He laughs at the pique in my voice. ‘First of all, very little I have ever done is selfless; secondly, I now had all the comforts in the world thanks to your timely UPS shipment.’

I pick at a shard of pork on the side of the pan. ‘And she was happy? This pampered soulless creature?’